SXSW: I Hope AT&T Goes Down (video)

Ok, I’ve never actually wanted a service to not function and I am partially joking, but it would be great if AT&T service would go down here at SXSW 2010 in Austin. Why? Because perhaps then there would be actual talking and networking at the event. I say the same thing every year and I assume this year there will be even more online chatter instead of offline networking and handshakes.

With that said, AT&T has apparently put a lot of capital investment into the Austin area recently to help handle the traffic loads with iPhone users wanting to tell their “friends” what they are doing while at the SXSW event. There’s a card in the schwag bag that outlines what AT&T has done to handle the load.

MG Siegler at Techcrunch has a post that discusses last year’s AT&T service — he uses lots of words like “nightmare”, etc. I like this line the best, “I’m leaving for Austin tomorrow and I’m terrified of what the AT&T situation will be when I get there.” Read that again – MG is TERRIFIED that he might not be able to both update Foursquare and also write what our sources tell us will be 43.2 Foursquare stories. MG did get a freebie from Sprint (which I am on, pay for each month and had great service last year) so that means he should be A-OK for coverage posts.

Check out the video of the registration line below. Count how many people are either talking on their phones or looking at their phones versus how many people are looking up and/or talking to someone.

Put the phone away, smile, talk to people and meet new people. Learn something new at a session. All the social networks will be there when you get back to your home or office and you can then post updates.